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The Day the Music Died

the stars, the tour, the crash and the aftermath

On February 3, 1959, rock & roll legends, Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and "The Big Bopper" died violently in a frozen Iowa field. The event was the first tragedy of the rock & roll era and was later called "The Day the Music Died." Learn about the final, fatal tour of the three stars and the fateful conditions, events and decisions that led to the tragedy.

This behind-the-scenes look at “The Day the Music Died” tragedy will provide answers to many questions. What caused the tragedy? How did a half-dollar decide life or death? Why was Buddy Holly’s concert tour called “the tour from hell?” What controversy arose 50 years after the crash? What joking comment haunted a survivor for years? What future star received his big career opportunity as a result of the tragedy?

Joe Koper has been a fan of rock & roll since his youth and remembers, as a boy, hearing the news reports about “The Day the Music Died.” After serving in the U.S. Army and earning degrees from Gannon College and George Washington University, Joe’s career was in human resources management, followed by post-retirement “careers” as a landscape designer and crew member on the Oxford-Bellevue Ferry.

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